

:«i»S^!fems 





Class JP_S3_£_Lr 



Copyright N"^ 



)^6I 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSa 



L 



OTHER NOTES 



BY 

MARY BOOLE HINTON 



WASHINGTON, D. C: 

THB NEALE PUBLISHING COMPANY 

431 Eleventh Street 

MCMI 



'T'S-SsTiC 



,X?%(2P? 



THF LI»f\AP?Y OF 

CC NGRESS, 
Two Ounes Received 

DEC. 18 190t 

OOP"WSHT ENTRY 

CLASS ft^ XXc No. 



i*^tn 



Copyright, 1901, by the Neale Pcblishing Comfany 



TO mv HUSBAND 



"The Quest After Music" originally appeared 
in the Atlantic, "Root and Rose" in Harper's 
Magazine, ' ' Body and Spirit ' ' in The Sunday 
School Times, "Any Daughter to Any Mother" 
in The Outlook, and are republished in this vol- 
ume by kind permission. 

M. B. H. 



Errata 



T]:oiight- Tine !^ix. 

For needRt read ne^^dest . 

En Happort with a Butterfly- Line Seven 
T^or Beaviteous wight read radiant gi 

A T.aburnurn in October- Line Ten. 

For passions 'b read passion •«, 

The Little Poet- Line Twenty three. 
For tunes read tune . 

Sonnet on the Petrarohan- Line Eight . 
For yoi; read ye. 

ileoision- Line Fifteen. 

For As v/e choose read As we chose . 

Punctuation, 

TJature's Notes- Line Sixteen, 
No period after "Own" 

T' id summer- Line Eleven. 

No period after "drowned" 



CONTENTS 



HAOK 



The Quest After Music 9 

The Yellow Trumpet lo 

Thought . - - - ID 

Sons of the Morning - 1 1 

The Pearl Diver - ----- - 12 

Revery ... - - 13 

Any Daughter to Any Mother ----- 13 

En Rapport with a Butterfly - - - - - - 14 

Love Song 15 

A Laburnum in October ------- 16 

The Little Poet - - - 17 

Requiescat - - - ig 

In Far Japan - 19 

Root and Rose - - 19 

Body and Spirit -------- 20 

The Hermit --------- 21 

Life and Song - - - - 22 

Too Close to the Music ------ 23 

A Notebook of Auld Lang Syne ----- 24 

Out of Tune - 25 

Nature's Notes ........ 26 

Sonnet on the Petrarchan ------ 27 

A Last Confession --------28 

The Future of Ivan Ivanovitch ----- 29 

Midsummer - - - 30 

The Seer - - - 30 

Idolatry -31 

7 



HAHK 

Prelude and Revery ------- 32 

The Keltic Magic ------- 33 

Credo ---------- 34 

Election - - - 34 

Serpent on the Hearth 35 

Emotion - - - - 37 

Ufe - 37 

Elizabethan Lyric - - 38 

Moods ---------- 39 

After Death --.-----40 

Revengefulness 41 

Personality - - - - 41 

The Musician's Nirvana --42 

Decision ---43 

Cadence Song - -.- 44 

Notes - -- -47 



Cbe Quest ntur IttMsk 

A voice, a voice is calling through the night. 
Sleepers, awaken ! Get each one his light, 
His woodman's axe to cleave the undergrowth 
Of clasped boughs to human entry loath, 
His keen- wrought sword to fight with savage foe, 
His fair-rigged skiff to cross where rivers flow. 

'T were like the rush of feet from diverse ways 
Where men have seen a distant city blaze. 

A voice, a voice is calling through the night. 

Sof?ie bemg calls ! Our fathers judged aright 

Who peopled sound of wave and song of wind 

With multitudinous things of spirit kind. 

Sovic being calls! Some being hides within 

The magic tuning of the violin, 

The glad rejoicing of the golden horn, 

The hautbois mournful as a ghost forlorn. 

The cymbal's sweep that mocks a wild typhoon, 

The gentle flute, the harp, the deep bassoon. 

So7)ic being calls ! and they, the called, are blest 
Who yield their lives unto a fruitless quest. 
Who still pursuing have not cried "Too late ! '" 
Till Music finds them dead beside her gate. 



Che Vellow Crumpet 

(At the Banda Rossa) 

A lake of sound. O'er leaning thence 
The yellow trumpet looked at me 
Corolla- wise, rememberingly. 

Dreamful, reproachful gaze intense : 
"You are of us . Come back , " it said , 
" To music and to maidenhead." 

Love-bound I would not hie me hence. 
Yet wan-hope toil more heartsome grew 
Because the yellow trumpet knew. 



Cbongbt 

All thought at birth, at birth, 

Is some one's love or pain 

Chilled journeying through the brain, 

Frore — lifeless — come to earth. 

Cold crystal ! thee I touch. 
Thou needst not flinch, close-pressed. 
In thee the hurrying passions rest, 
That clamored overmuch. 



$oit$ of the mornittd 

All the sons of the morning sang for gladness. 
Homer, Virgil, and thou, revered Catullus, 
Masters are ye with dread averted faces. 

All the sons of the morning sang for gladness. 
Who of poets will tell me what that song was ? 
Who of harpers retone its voiceless music ? 

Like a soul that has sinned beyond redemption, 
Like the fruit-of- the- womb that dies untimely, 
Thus I perish, I faint afar from wisdom. 

Dree my heart is that thirsts for classic fountains. 
Deserts climbing to touch the dim horizon 
Close up round me and suck me down in silence. 



Hark ! With murmur of distant deathless voices, 
Lo, the sons of the morning hail me friendly. 
Great their dole is for outcast fellow singers. 



Cbc P«arl DHJcr 

There was agelong gloom in the coralled caves, 

Where the veil of a turbulent sea 
Did hide all else save the oarweed frond 

By the barrier reef trailed free. 

No hope from the dip of the curlew's wing, 

The stare of the cold white star. 
What bodeth it, then, that a storm-spent sail 

Is afloat on the waters afar? 

The diver leaned out o'er the stern of the boat. 
And he murmured in tremulous tone : 

" O, dark, dark depths, there are pearls in you ; 
Be comforted — I have known . ' ' 



Just such a sound as makes us think — How Still ! 

Just such a silence that we whisper — Hark ! 
And wait some voice to come ; entranced the will ; 

The light all vanished though it is not dark. 
Just such a wakening that our dream thoughts cling 

And seem to plead : ' ' We could pass if we would. ' ' 
Trembles unearthly fantasy — takes wing^ 

Wooed hence unto a deeper solitude. 



Any Daugbtcr to jHlny mother 

In bitter pangs the babe was borne ; 

By greater pangs the child was reared. 
Not yet the mother's heart, though torn, 

Was scarred and seared. 

Bxit will left will dividing far ; 

'Tis written in the book of fate 
That each must follow^ his own star, 

And all must wait. 

Mother, in thine a mother's hand 
Is clasped to-day across the years. 

In the great hand of God we stand. 
And smile through tears. 



€n Rapport mitt) 4 Butterfly 

Far out above the wistful wav^e, 

Now up the woodland hill, 
Then far, far out, thy tired wings 

Fly on — and weakening still 
Fly on, fly on, a sorrowing flight ; 

Nor mayest thou understand 
How 5'earningly I watch thy way — 

He hasteth to my hand. 

How exquisite the clinging of 

His little, little feet. 
Oh! life's a field-of-cloth-of-gold 

Where fellow kings may meet. 
And we are kings in comradeship, 

Thou wind-borne winged one fair. 
My heart returned from following thee 

To find thee harbored there. 

Stay, stay awhile thouVfjeauteous wight 
Whom love hath lured to me, 

Whom very love hath made my own; 
What Morrow-guest shall be 

If ghoul-like thoughts with furtive steps 
Blackhooded from the light 

Slink down the stairway of my soul 
And peer into the night ! 



Cove Song 

Hath anyone taken the bloom oflf 

Thy love for me ? 
Is it entire and single 

On thy life's tree ? 
No one has taken the bloom off 

My love for thee. 
It is as God first grew it 

On my life's tree. 
One little bud he set there, 

Green veiled from sight. 
Followed a pure white blossom, 

Thy heart's delight. 
Soon the red fruit must ripen 

In summer sun. 
May the bloom blush on forever 

Till life is done. 



M EaDurnuttt in October 

One tree a blaze of blossom glowing glory-crowned. 
Nature, disrobing for her winter sleep, the ground 
With withered leaves, her garments cast aside, doth 

strew. 
Here only is there left the pleasaunce summer knew : 
Here only, desolation loiters in its quest. 
Thou tremulous thing of fire, I would upon my 

breast 
Some sacred type of joy's eternity enfold : 
Give me a branch ! So, swift athwart the dewy wold 
With eager hasting steps to touch the tree I went. 

Love, Love, when thy first passions 's burning 

breath is spent 
No Yellow Leaves bear thou where gold-heart 

bloom should cling. 
For I have faith, and there will come another Spring. 



Cbe Einic Poet 

A little poet singing down the lane — 

(Forgotten childhood come thou back again) 

A volume clasped against her heart with glee. 

What secret hidest thou from the world and me ? 

This darling book my darling verse shall keep, 

And I may safely leave it while I sleep. 

Oh may the script within be ever fair, 

And gracious fancies, only, written there. 

My little poet, all your themes were then 

Of God and nature and heroic men. 

The love of Christ illumed your childish eyes. 

A radiance gleamed from hills and seas and skies. 

But now the smoke of unforgiven wrongs 

Has lived to cloud and blacken all your songs. 

No lark may pipe athwart the stained page. 

No flower may bloom, and no enraptured sage 

Brave death for right — where lost in gloom profound 

The broken timbrel drags along the ground. 

Return, bright faith, return — as rivers flow 

From far ofi" heights through sunlit meads below . 

A bitter heart will jar the sweetest lyre. 

And who would save for Art his gift entire 

Must tune the soul — howe'er he tune^ the strings — 

When inspiration lifts her brooding wings. 



I^cduiescat 

Closer, closer clasp the earth mound. 
Be the head down prest. 
That's his breast ! 
Should a wandering grass stalk stray 
On the upper cheek this wa}^ 
That's the lappel over-folded ; 
Let it stay. 

He's so near. 

You have only to dig deep 

Were it not you fear 

The night blackness while men sleep. 

He's so far. 

There is no footway to that land 

On moon or sun or star, 

Where angel children quarrel for his hand. 

Hush ! sob softly — lest that voice divine 
Speaking you the grand, white samite line 

Should be forgot. 
Hush ! for the words make tune. 
Hush ! He will come quite soon. 
But tell it— not. 
Tell— it— not. 



i8 



Tn Tar japan 

A moss-lined wayside well. 
Bright tufts, therein, of pink begonia smiled. 
First time to see begonia growing wild 

Were joy no tongue could tell. 

Shall rude barbaric hands 
Play havoc, ruthless, leaving bare wet stone 
Harsh outlined where the little clump had grown 

Agirt with tendril bands ? 

Bear home thy treasure : 
Greed dies, the whilst regret is slowly born 
That any living thing should be so torn 

For our poor pleasure. 

Dear little plant and brave, 
Thy wrongs are over and my sin is past. 
Such mood of desecration be my last 

This side the grave. 



Hoot and Rose 

Such roots, good folk, can never bear a rose. 
Yea, we have sworn it. Let the blossom bloom. 
We righteous will not wot thereof, to whom 

A rose it shall not be on roots like those. 



Boay and Spirit 

He was thinking a thought when he died. 

As his soul slipped the leash from her place, 
A moment the thought dallied backward 

To write itself onto his face. 

Flesh of flesh, burning to ashes, 

Body, crumbling to dust. 
Hold for the High God his secret, 

Mouldering be true to thy trust. 

For earth in her dreams hath no treasure, 
Nor heaven in her heights — to compare 

With the glory of buried ideals. 

Heart-longings, a tear and a prayer. 



ZH permit 

(A Japanese Picture) 

Creatures of clay he takes and wind swept leaves 

That fall about his feet. 
He breathes thereon the breath of life, nor grieves 

When, fearlessly and fleet, 

They pass beyond him, faring to their kind. 

Yea, these, who are his own 
Yet are not freely his, he will not bind, 

But lives and dies alone. 

What guerdon hath he then for given-life ? 

Ask only such as he — 
Sin bearers, sorrow touched for human strife, 

Whose mood is mystery. 



Cife and Song 

Stay, Poet, if th}' griefs were grief, 
The words according well 

Would die unuttered on thy lips, 
Nor any tale would tell 

Sad kinsman of the soulless god 
That sighs in hollow shell. 

Nay, rather, if my griefs be grief, 
The words according well, 

Must pour impassioned from my lips 
Their wildest tale to tell. 

The sorrows of the morning are 
The songs of Vesper Bell. 



Coo €lo$e to m music 

Too close to the music — then crawl 
Like a blindworm avoiding the light 

Round yon ledge in the rear of the hall . 
Hang over and hear it aright. 

Too close? What's that strange phrase of thine? 

Ask the man with his hand on the drum 
If he flinch, if he swerve out of line 

Lest the tone-beats his brain should benumb. 

From the depths of that whirlpool of sound 

Comes a voiceless but terrible cry, 
While the harmonies eddy around : 

" More close, even yet, and more nigh." 

Then a forward lean of the life 

And a forward tilt of the soul 
Till we joy in the shriek of the fife, 

Till there's a rapture where trumpet blasts roll. 

'Tis not Fear that shall claim us at last. 

As we kneel at thy feet to adore, 
Mighty Song, draw us close, dangers past. 

To thy wonderful heart evermore. 



23 



B notctooR of nm turn $vne 

Half smilingly, in reverie mood, 

I con these pages o'er, 
Until the soul-life of a child 

Becomes my soul once more. 

Athrill with weird imaginings, 

See, here the wan script runs : 
'A thousand sun-lit gods beneath 
A thousand god-lit suns." 

Old rhymes, wherein the language lilt 
Glides twirling from the sense, 

Ye have a strange new meaning, fraught 
With deepest consequence. 

I'm harking for my sun-lit gods 
That crooned, yon far-off day. 

What dire enchantment me beguiled 
To weep long years away ? 

The earth's atremble with their tread. 

I greet them, glad and strong. 
Heart's temple (altar, choir, and crypt). 

Grows vibrant by their song. 



24 



Out of tunc 

Hear how the sense doth shrink 
As from a crevasse brink 

At the slightest swerve in tone. 
Seemeth a wizard hidden 
Dabbleth in things forbidden 
Save to the Gods alone. 

Hence must my spirit cry 
For music as on high 

That knoweth no mortal bond ; 
Loosed from the scale of seven 
Wing through the heights of Heaven, 

Find the beyond. 



25 



nature's notes 

There's a lilt, lilt, lilt of falling water, 
There's a tune, tune, tvine of falling sound. 

There's a dream, dream, dream of mystic music, 
Ghost-like, crossing mortal bound. 

There's a lilt, lilt, lilt of falling water, 
There's a tune, tune, tune of falling sound. 

There's a trill, trill, trill of bird musicians. 

But 'tis hard to find the key ; 
Half caressing and half mocking 

Is their challenge tossed to me. 
There's a trill, trill, trill of bird musicians. 

But 'tis hard to find the key. 

There's a sigh, sigh, sigh of winds that soaring 
Search the heights and deeps of tone. 

I hear them following, following nature's notes 
That yet shall be my own . 

When my spirit goes exploring 
All the heights and deeps of tone. 



26 



Sonnet on tbc Petrarchan 

The Octave is a dive into the deep 

Whose long, long moment hurryeth after Light ; 

An arrow perilously poised for flight 

The griev&d hand constraining scarce may keep ; 

A whirlpool dallying in its central sleep 

Ere yet the tangent tides fling forth their might. 

Up-gathered forces — lost to sound and sight, 

Where e'er you are your prisonment I weep. 

In glory as of myriad falling stars 
Loosed be the sextet from all bonds and bars, 
Primordial Impulse greatened through control. 
Thee will I worship in thy straightmost laws 
Sonnet of sonnets, deathlessly — because 
Thy story is the story of my soul . 



27 



B Cast Confession 

You ask me why I did not take the veil, 

Though all my life had set my heart thereon ; 

Why ere I came within the convent's pale 
A lower impulse won ; 

Why I forsook the lyord and His dear ways 
For human loves, for earthly joys and sin ; 

And why I now am come to end my days 
This holy place within. 

It was a vision that I saw which broke 
The cherished purpose of my virgin years — 

Small grabbling hands and mournful eyes that spoke 
Albeit dimmed by tears. 

And labyrinthine curves of golden hair — 

A pure, sweet forehead floating down beside — 

Ah, me ! the face was marvelously fair — 
In awful doubt, I cried: 

' ' My son that is to be ! What ri^-hi have I 
To rob thee of thy passion to be born , ' ' 

Not though I shrive my soul in agony, 
The body scourged and torn. 

"Unconscious will, whose fires of life are lit 
With longing that my flesh may be thy home 

Till thou hereafter breaking forth from it 
In light of days to come, 

28 



"And girding on the stature of a man, 

Wilt need no longer woman's wistful care — 

I vow to end my days where I began — 
In love and faith and prayer." 

So spake I, and so acted out — but now 

My husband's spirit with my God's is blent — 

And that is well — death-dews creep o'er my brow — 
My length of days is spent. 

cne Tumre of Ivan Twnovitcb 

Ivan Ivanovitch, the Terrible! 

A woman sinned through sudden fright. 

He struck her soul into the night. 
The bleeding body, headless, knelt on still. 
By shedding of the blood he changed the will. 
How must she love him in the life to be 
With higher visions of eternitj' ; 
And honor him, and ever count him friend, 
If he but make her holy in the end I 

Ivan Ivanovitch, the Just ! 

A soul may sin, but not through ftight. 
A soul may sin for sin's delight. 
Hence, haply while the hand well poised dealt death , 
Swift thoughts sped spaceward, borne by dying 

breath — 
I " On these foundations, well and truly laid, 
{He shall upbear the standard he has made. 
jOn him, on him may fall the wrath divine. 
! Should he condone a greater sin than mine." 
i 29 



midsummer 

Sea Sand : 

I touch thee. 
Thou burnest my hand. 

So joy would burn. 

Sea Wrack : 

I feel thee. 
Pikelets pierce back. 

So doth sorrow pierce. 

Sea Sound : 

I salute thee. 
Chanting the requiem of the drowned. 

Chant my requiem. 



Cbc $cer 



I came to him, kneeling ; I asked of him then 

Would you die ? 
Your life ebbs out for men. 

But a heart-throb sang in the tones of the sea : 

Ah, why 
Does the world bring its love-life to me ? 



Tdolatry 

What hast thou done, little maiden, 

Wonderful little maid ! 
Hast taken the gods of the heathen 

To be thy dolly instead ? 

Terrible gods come acrushing 

The sensuous human soul ; 
Not to thy hurt, my childling. 

Do the wheels of juggernaut roll. 

There ! Sit thee down on the trackway 
And croon thy dolly a song ; 

Let the procession sweep by thee, 
Queenling, whom none may wrong. 

Nor shalt thou wrong thine own spirit, 
So this commandment thou heed : 

" Curb the wild impulse of worship. 
Mothering human need." 



31 



Prcluae ana Reverie 

PRELUDE. 

This rock becomes a little isle 

Encircled by the sea, 
Where fancy's dreaming heart may rest 

And fancy's thoughts flow free. 

Dip, sea-shell, dip — a cup of love. 

How salt so e'er it be, 
While Lucy in the Isle of Man 

Another drinks to me. 

REVERIE. 
We, side by side, 
Half turn the head 
For inward dread 
An empty space may give the lie 
When spirits know each other nigh . 

Still side by side. 

Whose fingers silt the sand, 
Whom seas on seas divide. 

We, side by side, 

Hand never touching hand, 
Nor voice aye echoing speech, 
Endlessly out of reach, 
Remote as star from star. 

Answer this question, dear: 
What is it to be far 9 
What is it to be nearf 



Cne Keltic magic 

(A sonnet on the sonnet.) 

Tell me the stor>' of thy during heart, 

Mage Merlin ! 'Mid the drowse of Keltic dreams 
Ancestral censors swing from carven beams. 

Prayer- wise, aswoon, I vision what thou art. 

Oft in my visioning the tears down start. 
Oft as I track thee in my quest, meseems 
Lamp-like and tremulant the Oak-bole gleams. 

Worlds must not hear us where we talk apart ! 

Weird from his eerie crypt the Sonnet sings : 
I have no likeness with material things, 

Nor pearl, nor casket, nor the blown seashell. 
Locked is my secret while the words go by. 
For understanding darkens to a cry. 

Child of the Kelt, thou knowest; thou knowest 
me well. 



33 



€reao 

Thought- wise my soul's agnostic in its trend, 

But music-wise, is mystic to the end. 

Bare lies the shrine, safe guarded from belief. 

Ramparts are vain. Let song, however brief, 

Light in her farings near the altar stone. 

'Tis rife with gods ! 'tis vibrant, star-bestrown . 



election 

All love not Thee, O Christ, who truly love. 
Helpless the harp -like spirit of the child 
Awaits some call divine. Who comes too late 
This quest must lose. Who comes betimes may win 
The worshipper Thou, Jesus, didst not claim. 
No Hell, therefore, no Heaven ; but after death 
Each goes to his own gods and is content. 



34 



Che Serpent on the Fjeartb 

(The woman speaks. ) 

What is that lying on the hearth ? 

So cold, so cold, so cold. 

A babe that sleeps — my God, will it never wake? 

What is that lying on the hearth ? 

So cold, so cold, so cold. 

Stone imaged — still — my God, 'tis a rattlesnake! 

Strange comrades, these, upon one hearth — 
A serpent and my child — 
My tmdefiled. 

Ho! serpent of the glistening eyes, 
That charm to slay. 
For you the forest vast, 
Fate's horoscope has cast. 
For me the hearth so small, 
Which was mv all. 



I have not hurt you in your place ! 
Did I or any dear one stray 

Your way 
I had not said you nay, 

But bowed before you in life's race. 
For you the forest lands are wild. 
But yet you came upon my hearth ! 
But yet you killed my child ! 



35 



Ho, serpent of the glistening eyes, 

Now darkening, tell me true, 
Is there one thing you really love ? 
I hold you do. 

See, see yon fateful script illume the walls. 
The devils know it, pacing fiery halls ; 
The angels know it, kneeling by the throne — 
That motherhood shall be avenged in motherhood 
alone. 

Back to your nest, back, back. 

And cover up the track. 

I'd scorn to spy upon you as you pass. 

You'll hear my feet crush the dried grass. 

(The serpent speaks.) 

For me the brake, the bight ! 

Thou woman wight. 

It vanisheth ; 
It dwindleth as a trail 
Upon the sands ; 

And death breeds death. 
Sick are the forest lands. 
None knoweth the might of human eyes : 

Who feels them dies. 
The shrinking forests quail 

And close about 
The shuddering shapes within 

That are my kin. 
Lost rivers call us from without . 

36 



Thine, thine the hearth so small ! 
Who hath the hearth hath all. 
Erewhilst one firelight ray- 
Enkindled yesterday, 
Behold it shimmer on the golden corn , 
Torch light of generations yet unborn . 

Man's child, thou heir of Heaven and hell, 
Primordial monsters cry, entombed: 
"The chosen shall not curse the doomed." 
Farewell ! Farewell ! 



Cifc 

This pencil pleaseth me not, 
For it lacketh the rubber end. 

My lines stray wide ; 

But the salt teartide 
Doth blear and blot. 

Not righten the crooked trend. 
This pencil pleaseth me not. 



Emotion 

Emotion is a vice like drink. 

Take heed you do not feel. 
Jerk off high dreaming in a twink. 

If through the soul it steal. 
Some erring temper-gust, forthright 
Proves you a hypocrite. 

37 



l/ 



Elizabethan Cyric 

Calm and still, calm and still, 
Wandereth my soul at will 

Through the upper sphere. 
Sad and slow, sad and slow, 
Toileth on my flesh below 

In the darkness here. 

Not to me, not to me, 
Is there rest eternally. 

Free from impulse strange. 
For my peace, for my peace, 
Waning starlike it shall cease, 

Fading it shall change. 

So my grief, so my grief, 
Maketh its abiding brief. 

Yea, and tarry eth not. 
But my love, but my love, 
Fixed is as light above. 

Though all else forgot. 



38 



moods 

Two moods dispart my soul. 

Today which shall it be — 
The mood of bitterness ? 

The mood of reverie ? 
Lord, Thou hast bid me fail. 

My duties broken lie 
Under the weakening hand, 

Thou, only, knowest why. 
Success without the walls 

Is haughtily a king. 
Night-long mine ears do plaine 

His cruel blazoning. 
Glory my birthright is ; 

Bereft of earth's delights 
The veriest babe up-built 

A stairway to the heights. 
Shall radiant gods down -troop 

Who sing my soul adream. 
Who hourly me baptise 

A follower of the gleam ? 
Then let no direful thought, 

No desperate mood of mine, 
Be cherished so to wound 

Those visitants divine. 

Two moods dispart my soul 
Today which shall it be — 

The mood of bitterness ? 
The mood of reverie ? 
39 



Jffter Death 

(Founded on passage in the Zend Avesta.) 

Three long days the righteous soul fleeteth . 
As earth dim recedeth, recedeth, 
A mystical maiden he meeteth. 

Thy good deeds, she saith, gone before thee, 
Are quickened in me to adore thee. 
Like perfume about thee and o'er thee. 

He following, he following, she guiding, 
They enter the place of abiding, 
The halls of unevil-betiding. 

But joy like to thine, O, my poet, 

No angel-tongued paean could show it. 

No rapt mortal vision foreknow it. 

To thee when the world-pageant shifted, 
A magical music came drifted — 
Thy lyrics in glory uplifted . 



40 



Kcvetidcfulness 

Sins are but Burglars in the house of life 
Claiming no favor of the inhabitant. 

Bolts must be wrenched and lintels torn away 
And armed conscience, gasping, gagged and bound 
Ere wickedness plants foot upon the stair. 

What monster sin is this who comes by night, 
Hugging his permit from the deathless past ? 

Aha, my shuddering soul, thou criest : Avaunt ! 
Yet cans't not choose but sanction, — so thou hear 
The scraping of his latch key in the lock. 



Personality 

Thee, little boat, I erst did guide 
With a tow rope dipped athwart the tide, 
And tug through harsh canals : 
Now down the natural waterfalls 

Of feeling shalt thou go. 

Whose trend was ever so. 
What ailed thee, then, before? 

Heighho ! the banks have a natural curve. 

The reeds lean out with a natural swerve, 
And we are we once more. 



m musician's nirvana 

In the day when the stars shall cease singing, when 
lute, harp and voice 

Shall not woo the lulled soul of the singer to rise 
and rejoice — 

In the place where I was let men listen with raptu- 
rous ears 

To a wonderful sound in the wonderful song of the 
spheres. 

Let no mention be made of my name or my deeds 
any more. 

Let my speech be the moaning of seas and the cat- 
aract's roar 

And the wailing of winds and the strong everlast- 
ing vibration 

Of harmonies thrilled through the heights and the 
depths of creation. 

Be music my spirit — not mine but her spirit in me ; 

Be music my worship — for whoso adores her is she. 

Soul in anguish, climb out on the resonant blast of 
the horn. 

Never more, never more in the wheel of rebirths to 
be bom. 



Decision 

Musing on the bridge he standeth, 
Listeth low and listeth long, 

Till the detonating water 

Seems to call him in its song ; 

Call him, by the wistful heart-love 
Of the sinless for the strong: 

"'Dreamer — on the bridge of Judgment 
O'er the river's rushiyig tide — 

Keystone sways ; the bridge is falling ; 
Flee to one or other side. 

Are you hero? Are you traitor? 
Soon, Ah, soon the floods divide !'' 

Still, in passionless compassion 

Welled up words that could not wait 

''As we choose i?i s?nall things always 
We mtist choose at last in great ; 

For 'tis then the gods deny us 
Our own hand upo7i our fate. ' ' 



43 



Cadence $m 

A yearning for the cadence, for the cadence at its 

close 
Is the story of all music ; and the secret music 

knows 
Is a yearning for the cadence, then the cadence at 

its close. 

How my heart desires the cadence while the music 

winding flows ! 
Every inlet, every islet into vivid greenness grows 
When my heart desires the cadence while the music 

winding flows. 

If my heart desires the cadence as a bee desires the 

rose 
Give me, give me nozv the cadence, never waiting 

for the close. 
'Tis the cadence that is calling while the winsome 

blossom blows. 

Two strong chords, forever chiming, shall they 

bring divine repose ? 
Shall they rock me in the garden where the god of 

music goes? 
Two strong chords, forever chiming, shall they 

bring divine repose ? 

Nay ! there's cloying, Ah ! there's cloying in the 
sweetness of the rose 

44 



And the only joy eternal is a joy that comes and 

goes. 
There is cloying in the sweetness of the music or 

the rose. 

Then a yearning for the cadence, for the cadence 

at its close 
Is'the story of all music ; but the secret music knows 
Is a yearning -strain, alternate with the enraptured 

cadence close ! 



45 



NOTES 



Out of Cunt 

Music's limitation to twelve notes, out of an infinite 
number of possible notes, must stimulate an enlightened 
imagination. "Why, Oh why, that great forbidding ?" is 
the cry of the child when first she comes upon the problem. 
Hardly may the trained musician find answer for it. 

Idolatry 

The words doll and idol were formerly, by a fanciful ety- 
mology, held to be identical. How mystically does not the 
little wooden image focus to itself two complementary 
needs of our nature — something to wonship, something to 
protect. Oft the one impulse runs riot while the other 
lapses through inanition. So strong is the power of little- 
motherhood that one might imagine it potent against all 
harms of soul and body. The awful Juggernaut car ploughs 
its course through blood ; the maddened votaries cast them- 
selves before it. Yet must the oncoming procession turn 
aside by reason of a little child. 

eadence Song 

Cadence phrases are phrases on which the ear comes to 
rest. By cadence is here meant the Perfect Cadence, the 
Tonic chord preceded by the Dominant. Much of the older 
music, sectionally constructed, derives its charm from the 
frequent but momentary touching of the key-note. Im- 
provisation, too, oft keeps the ear in suspense hovering 
about the key-note, suggesting, sounding, quitting. The 
Cadence Song records the real experiment of a musical 
child who tried to construct a music that should be all 
cadence. 



47 



Dec 19 tOiys. 



DEC 18 



1 COPY DEI. TO CAT. D!V. 
DtC. 19 1901 



